Global warming is an environmental problem, not a political one. And people who try to ‘solve’ it with political or public relations spin are just making the problem worse,” said James Hoggan, co-founder of the DeSmogBlog.

“Yet the spin campaign continues, and it’s becoming more insidious. Climate spin used to be all about denial – self-appointed experts took money from the energy industry and then denied that humans are affecting life on earth.

But the new spin is even more dangerous and sly. Now, it’s all about delay and distraction. Now, spindoctors in industry and government are acknowledging the science, but arguing that we shouldn’t or can’t act quickly to correct the problem.”

Barack Obama may not be the worst offender among the spinmeisters, but he’s the biggest disappointment.

An outspoken supporter of the U.S. coal industry, Obama has presented himself as someone who can overcome the Bush legacy of inaction on climate change. But he is campaigning on a greenhouse gas reduction ‘target’ that the U.S. won’t have to meet for 42 years and he has continued to promote the current administration’s plan to circumvent the Kyoto Protocol, the only international climate agreement currently in place.

The world has a right to expect more from a man who wants to be the Democratic candidate for President of the United States,” Hoggan said.

This is the first year for the SmogMaker Awards, honoring those who have subverted honest and forthright public conversation on global warming.

Judged by an expert panel of fraudbusters – the staff at the climate change watchdog DeSmogBlog.com – these awards recognize clever, deceptive or merely devious public relations campaigns.

The winners have distinguished themselves in five categories:

Individual

After nearly two full terms of a Republican President who sponsored climate-science censorship, the world has been looking forward to any successor as an improvement.

But on climate change, Barack Obama, is looking like George Bush lite.

While the world’s leading scientific bodies tell us we need to act immediately to avoid catastrophic climate disruption, Obama has set his own target date at 2050, long past any opportunity for voters to hold him accountable. His short-term strategy is the same as President Bush’s; Obama wants to create a new Global Energy Forum that doesn’t include the cleanest and most progressive (European) economies.

If Obama wants to be taken seriously on climate change, he has to stop promoting coal and start setting realistic, urgent strategies.

(Addendum: Joseph Romm at climateprogress.org has taken a convincing whack at us for this award, pointing out rightly that Obama has indeed called for at least one substantive early target - to reduce U.S. emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 - and that he includes Europe's biggest economies in some elements and some versions of his climate plan. That, however, leaves the issues of his support for coal and an ethanol plan that follows G. W. Bush in, mostly, pandering to the U.S. agriculture lobby. Romm criticizes the DeSmogBlog for singling out Obama, a relative good guy, rather than President Bush. We'd like to point out that our position - really, everyone's position - on the Bush performance is pretty much on the record. We were hoping to kickstart a discussion about the person currently advertising himself as the change agent. If Barack Obama offers any convincing counterpoint on his coal position, we'd be happy to “strip him” of this award. In the meantime, our position stands: he's spinning the American people on this issue.)

Having signed an international agreement that committed the country to reducing its CO2 emissions by 6 per cent from 1990 levels, Canada increased its annual output by 35 per cent. Now, the Canadian government has joined the world’s biggest polluters to block, divert, or minimize any new global warming agreements.

In fact, notwithstanding that it is one of the wealthiest countries in the world, and one of the top five per-capita polluters, Canada says it won’t lift a finger against climate change unless the big emitters in the developing world first commit to taking action.

Media

News baron Rupert Murdoch startled the world in May of this year by announcing that he is worried about climate change and determined to bring his worldwide News Corp. into the international battle for better performance and better policy.

Yet his Fox News still employs the likes of climate quibbler Brit Hume and Steve Milloy, a PR guy who went from defending tobacco on behalf of Philip Morris to questioning climate change on behalf of the energy industry.

The idea that a man who created an entire right-of-centre network is now standing back in protection of journalistic independence is beyond quaint.

By accepting the science behind climate change as early as 2004, Lomborg presented himself as a climate moderate. Then he launched an international campaign to distract public policy makers by understating the potential devastation of climate change, while setting up a false choice between spending money addressing global warming or spending instead on eradicating poverty or AIDS.

The SmogMaker Awards are sponsored by DeSmogBlog.com, a website dedicated to exposing the public relations spin that has so distorted the debate about global warming.

DeSmogBlog co-founder James Hoggan is the president of the award-winning public relations firm James Hoggan & Associates. He is also Chair of the David Suzuki Foundation, a Trustee of the Dalai Lama Center for Peace and Education, and a board member of Future Generations. Mr. Hoggan also chairs a sustainable development project in the Four Great Rivers region, an environmentally pristine, but endangered corner of Eastern Tibet.

May I refer you to:
http://www.desmogblog.com/400-prominent-scientists-dispute-global-warming-bunk
and:
http://www.desmogblog.com/100-discredited-self-interested-and-or-deluded-scientists-question-climate-change

This stuff is REALLY old, Dr Coles. 90% of the people who sign these things or are added to them without their knowledge have the most dubious claims to expertise in climate science, or are quoted out of context. The folks who put them together just keep their fingers crossed that nobody will actually bother to check.

2) There is no increase in global temperature over the last 10 years, see:
http://www.remss.com/pub/msu/monthly_time_series/RSS_Monthly_MSU_AMSU_Channel_TLT_Anomalies_Land_and_Ocean_v03_0.txt
(And the year 2007 is the coldest on record for this millenium.)

1) and how thick is the sea ice? I’ll wait to see how much of it disappears next summer, thanks. And you might like to check this site:
http://ice-glaces.ec.gc.ca/app/WsvPageDsp.cfm?ID=11886&lang=eng

2) I guess we aren’t reading the same sources. Personally, I prefer to credit the analysis of people who actually know how to interpret the raw data, ie – climate scientists – over the opinion of someone with no expertise in the science, such as yourself, for instance.

1) These values are global values, and refer to deviation from a period average, adjusted for the season. Note that, obviously, SH ice coverage goes down when the NH ice coverage goes up, and vice versa. The point is that, objectively speaking, based on actual data, not model data or nursery stories, the total global sea ice coverage is currently above average.
Which is not what one hears from Rev Gore, Dr Suzuki, RealClimate, or IPCC.

2) There is no interpretation needed. The facts (measured values) are there, and all you have to do is to tabulate and/or plot the data, and see for yourself. The fact is that there has been no increase in average global temperature over the last 10 years (despite continously increasing CO2 levels).
Again, this is not what one hears from Rev Gore, Dr Suzuki, RealClimate, or IPCC.

1) Your only show local data, while the data I linked to are global.
So the fact remains, the total global see ice coverage is above average.

2) In that data (from 1979 - 2007) you can actually see that there has been no increase in the last 10 years (1998 - 2007). (And, of course, if you trend it you will see it even clearer.)
So the fact remains, the average global temperature has not increased over the last 10 years.

JIK I plotted the last 10 years of global temps for you over two weeks ago. Here is a copy of my post on a previous thread where you made the same lying, distortion of scientific facts as you are doing here. People like you disgust me.

“JIK, don’t you ever get tired of being shown how wrong and stupid you are? Do your work colleagues realize how poor you are at math and statistics (not to mention reading simple words and numbers)?

Right hand column represents the rate of change of temperature in degrees C for the given period (slope of the linear regression line). No matter which year you pick as a starting year the slopes are all positive, indicating RISINGTEMPERATURES.

How can anyone with even the lowest level of statistics say that temperatures have remained constant over the past 9 - 10 years, let alone say that they have dropped? For anyone who claims to be “an expert in statistics”, (M, M and W) it shows that they are liars.

There you go, JIK, no fancy graphs, no cloured maps just plain and simple data treated to a very simple statistical analysis. Still shows that you are either very stupid or a liar, take your pick”.

You exhibit one of the many arrogant and hypocritical techniques of the denier fanatics, you repeat time after time your worthless arguments which keep on being repudiated time after time.

it IS his real name and his scientific credentials are sound, which you would know if you really intended this to be a valid discussion. Personally, I find Dr Forrester’s input to be very informative (not the least bit “ranting”). Until you offer some kind of reason that I should accept your analysis of the data over his (which tends to support what I hear from the climate scientists), that is where it stands.

“you made the same lying, distortion of scientific facts as you are doing here”
“People like you disgust me”
“don’t you ever get tired of being shown how wrong and stupid you are”
“Do your work colleagues realize how poor you are at math and statistics (not to mention reading simple words and numbers)?”
“For anyone who claims to be “an expert in statistics”, (M, M and W) it shows that they are liars.”
“shows that you are either very stupid or a liar, take your pick”
“You exhibit one of the many arrogant and hypocritical techniques of the denier fanatics”

It is quite astonishing that you “find Dr Forrester’s input to be very informative (not the least bit “ranting”).”

Everything I have said about you is true. You are a disgusting person who is putting the lives and livelihoods of millions of people at risk because of the lies, distortions and misrepresentation of scientific facts you are repeating ad nauseam.

If you don’t like being shown for what you are then try telling the truth for once.

You set yourself up for Ian’s response in the tone of your own posts. You can’t complain if he responds in kind. I think he has shown a pretty high degree of restraint, considering some of the things you have said or implied about him.

Well, Fern, exactly when & where have I resorted to the kind of responses Dr Ian is so fond of?
What have I said about Dr Ian that he is so upset about?
With all due respect, Fern, I think you will find that I (as opposed to Dr Ian), almost always manage to keep my temper in check, and respond in a civilized manner.

These data happens to be more complete and objective that Dr Ian’s. E.g. Dr Ian uses Nov-Dec data only, while I use year round data, and he uses data based on frequently inaccurate wheather stations, while I use the more objective and accurate satellite data.

And no statistics is necessary, as the satellite data are clear and unambiguous.
(Whereas, as has been shown several times, by several people, Hansen’s and Mann’s statistical methods are often seriously flawed.)

regarding the Dec/Nov time frame, in which case that objection is not valid. My bad.
(Regardless, satellite data is complete and accurate, and the most objective data source we have for the 1979-2007 time period. And it shows no increase in average global temperature over the last 10 years.)

Have a look at this graph : it shows the trend; it shows that the temperatures in all of the last 10 years have been in the top 15 in recorded history; it shows that all of the averages since about 1985 have been above almost any recorded before 1980.

If we were to get another El Nino and suffer another 1998-style spike, you would surely dismiss it as a one-off - a veritable “weather event” that could not be used to demonstrate a trend over time. Yet you blindly ignore the trend in favour of this goofy contention that, because 1998 was exceptionally warm, every year since has demonstrated an end to global warming. Viewed with anything but ideological blinders, it is an insensible conclusion.

I admit that Ian Forrester has been using strong language in describing how stupifyingly indifferent you are to evidence, but Johan - buddy - he's got a point.

Using satellite data, and calculating the delta compared to the average monthly values for whole period covered, the resulting annual averages become:
2001 0.163
2002 0.279
2003 0.278
2004 0.178
2005 0.299
2006 0.210
2007 0.088
I.e. 2007 is coldest year in this millenium, century, and decade.
Additionally, 1995 and 1998 were also colder (since these measurements started in 1979).
I wonder how many years were warmer than 2007 in the 9th, 10th, and 11th century?
And what about any other year during the last 2000 years?

Btw, I never suggested that the data showed and end to (nor start of) global warming, I merely pointed out what the measured temperatures showed.

Johan, let me explain an important point about the data you’re placing so much emphasis on. You are absolutely correct in noting that the data from 1998 to 2007 show little secular change. However, the real questions to ask are “How meaningful is it to look at data over any short time span?” and “How short a time span is meaningful?” The answer to both questions is that ten years is just not justifiable. For example, consider how the data jump up and down in just a single year. Do you really think that a single year’s change is meaningful? I don’t. If you think that a single year’s change is meaningful, then how about a single month? A week? A day? A second? A microsecond?

We’re looking at a big, complicated phenomenon, so big and so complicated that we shouldn’t take short-term data too seriously. The more data we can take into consideration, the more reliable our results. A twenty-year stretch is twice as reliable (for looking at long-term changes) than a ten-year stretch. Ian is looking at the long-term data and reaching one conclusion and you’re looking at the short-term data and reaching the opposite conclusion. Ian’s conclusions are sounder than yours because they’re based on a broader base of data.

If you want to rely on cherry-picking short term data, then why don’t we just confine ourselves to the most recent data of all: 2006 to 2007, during which time the data value leapt from 0.65 to 0.75 – a 15% jump! Why, at that rate, we’ll be roasting in just 30 years and within a century the oceans will be boiling! Pretty absurd, huh? That’s what happens when you place emphasis on cherry-picked data. You have to look at the big picture.

Now, at this point, you might respond in some frustration, “But you’re ignoring the MOSTRECENT data! Sure, it might have been warming 15 years ago but it’s not warming now!” And that point would be a good one if we were just looking for any old changes underway, including completely unexpected ones. But we’re not just trolling through the data looking for random possibilities – we’re testing a specific hypothesis. That hypothesis is that increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere will lead to increasing temperatures. That hypothesis doesn’t say that it will lead to one decade being really warm and another decade being cooler. It predicts a regular, slow, steady increase in temperature. So, to test it, you use the longest range of data at your disposal. And that’s what Ian is doing – using all the data. You want to use just some of the data. What’s so magical or important about 1998? Did something climatologically important happen in that year? No. So there’s no reason to select that year for any special treatment. Like Justice, we should be blind to special considerations and give all the data fair treatment. We shouldn’t hand-pick our data to support or deny any particular hypothesis unless we can show that there’s a scientifically valid reason for doing so. And you don’t have a scientifically valid reason for making a cut at 1998 and excluding all the data before that date.

I’m really, really hoping that you’ll respond to this in a fair-minded and logical way.

Unfortunately, I don’t have time respond to it all, so here are just a couple of points:

1) Of course, one will get different results depending on the time period selected. This is a trick as old as statistics. My ten years could, however, be as valid as 30 or 100. Who knows what the time constant of the climate system might be?

2) “A twenty-year stretch is twice as reliable (for looking at long-term changes) than a ten-year stretch.” Well, the arithmetic is probably not that simple, but generally, sure, it could be correct. However, unless we know for sure that there are no shorter climate cycles or phenomenon than 10 years, my selected time period, 10 years, could be as relevant as any other time period.
(E.g. 1000 years ago it was warmer than today (Moberg, Loehle, et al), grapes were grown in Labrabor and England, the vikings did farming on Greenland, etc etc, does that mean that the trend is that trend is now that it’s getting colder?)

3) With the same data, i.e. that it was warmer 1000 years ago than today, and noting that the since the year 1000, the CO2 level has actually increased quite a lot, what does that say about the relationship between CO2 and temperature?

What you have written shows that you have absolutely NO knowledge about climate science, past, present or future. You are deliberately suggesting things to which there is no scientific evidence or the evidence says something completely different to what you are saying.

Your comments are absolutely worthless. By the way, the following comment by you at the start of this thread is a barefaced lie:

“2) There is no increase in global temperature over the last 10 years, see”

You then cherry pick the poorest of a number of different MSU data manipulations to “prove” your point.

MSU and AMSU do not measure temperature directly so there is a lot of confusion as to how they compare with each other as well as the surface temperatures. Since surface temperatures are actually measured and that is the part of the atmosphere that we inhabit I find them to be the most useful.

It’s true that your approach has not been the kind of insult-spouting and name-calling that some others resort to. A review of your posts here (and elsewhere – you & I have met at the Globe & Mail) suggests a more subtle campaign of niggling away one drip at a time, constantly claiming to have an equal grip on the science as Ian actually does have, but demonstrating in the content of your posts that you do not. Ian responds with scientifically supportable analysis and data, which you consistently dismiss out of hand and imply that anybody is qualified to interpret raw data – no special skill required. This is bound to stretch the patience of any person who really does know what he/she is talking about. It’s like talking to a brick wall, worse, a brick wall that is taunting you. I often encounter it myself in my own field (which is not science), and I can relate to an outburst of frustration.

Fern Mackenzie

p.s. to Ian Forrester: I apologize for inadvertently handing JIK this “Dr Ian” thing. I didn’t mean to add to the drip

I don’t think I have ever posted anythimg at G&M, at least not in the last few years. So perhaps you confuse me for someone else.

What I do is to provide links to objective data. There is no explanations, nor excuses, nor interpretations needed. Just look and the data and draw your conclusions.

As opposed to some, I am not an elitist. I trust the intelligence and analytical skills of most rational, sane, and reasonably educated people. Others resign, and simply trust whoever they decide to trust. It’s just a different approach to life, but I sincerely prefer mine. I think the world would be a better place with some more scepticism in it.

If you haven’t posted there, I guess my memory is faulty (put it down to a Senior’s Moment!)

I don’t think it is elitist to acknowledge that there might be factors influencing the meaningful analysis of raw climate data of which you or I are unaware. It’s called context. I have been a natural sceptic my whole life, and take nothing at face value. That’s why before I would take your analysis of the data (or my own) over that of a published climate scientist of good standing, I would need to know what is your experience in the field. “Most rational, sane, and reasonably educated people” know the level of their incompetence, and look to qualified people for answers.

Moderators, please block this idiot (i.e. Johan I Kanada). He’s not adding anything to the discussion and never really has. All he does is label people, question the authenticity of others’ names (while refusing to actually give his own), and repeats Cato Institute talking-points.

I really don’t think I am the one you should accuse of labeling people. Btw, I only question Ian’s name, and that for historical reasons. (Due to an old debate between us.) As far as Cato, I have never used them for climate related information and opinons. My sources, apart from those I have quoted here, include CA and Lubos Motl. You should check them out sometime.

I actually do add something to these discussions - it is called difference of opinion (and sometime different sets of information).

you may disagree with Steve M and Lubos M, but you must admit they are smart and knowledgeable people (not paid by Exxon).
By all means, rest, but that doesn’t mean you do not have the intellectual responsibility to evaulate and interprete more than one set of opinions.

Scientists gain respect by the number and quality of papers they publish in the peer reviewed scientific literature. McIntyre’s “papers” are nothing but a bad parody of the scientific principles. Just because he gets a whole army of rabid deniers populating his web site does not make it a source for scientific information.

It’s too bad that the energy he expends in this area could not be directed in a more positive manner. What he and his cohorts are doing is not part of the scientific method as used and acknowledged by the vast majority of scientists.

Prove your thesis by conducting independent research not by attacking and nit picking.

Motl is just a stupid egotist looking for his name in print. Seems that Harvard got fed up with his foolishness and sent him packing.

Check out Old Farmer’s Almanac. Admittedly, they are a bit behind the times: they don’t consider CO2, ‘forcings’ and all that, only relying on solar cycles. But they still are running at 80% accuracy rate ….

1) The Arctic sea ice minimum was at the end of the warm season, long over. The Arctic Ocean always freezes solid in the winter. As a helpful reference point for you, we’re in winter now. The concern is about Arctic sea ice. The plot you link to is for global ice.

You are posting links with bad data. A warning is currently posted on the U. of Illinois Cryosphere homepage:

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/

It says: “The timeseries graphs on this site are currently incorrect. We had a hardware problem corrupt the data and are currently recreating the timeseries from original data sources. Expect the correct data in 5-7 days. We apologize for the inconvenience.”

Here is a proper graph from the National Snow and Ice Data Center showing summer ice cover as a function of month & year -

2) The data speaks for itself, regardless of how denialist Think Tanks spin their talking points. Hadley Centre plots of NH, SH& World temperature time series - http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/

1) Your link applies only to the Arctic, and thus not to the global ice coverage situation.
Btw the warning is now removed, the data is presumably corrected, and the situation still the same, i.e. the global sea ice coverage is at the moment larger than normal.

2) Your data set speaks differently than mine (which of course you know already). So which is right? Yours, mine, both, or neither?
I prefer satellite data because I consider them most objective.
And, according to those data, there has not been any global warming over the last 10 years.

Climate Change: As a result of climate change, glaciers are melting faster; the polar ice caps are shrinking; trees are blooming earlier; more people are dying in heat waves; species are migrating, and eventually many will become extinct.

Barack Obama’s Plan
Reduce Carbon Emissions 80 Percent by 2050
Cap and Trade: Obama supports implementation of a market-based cap-and-trade system to reduce carbon emissions by the amount scientists say is necessary: 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050. Obama’s cap-and-trade system will require all pollution credits to be auctioned. A 100 percent auction ensures that all polluters pay for every ton of emissions they release, rather than giving these emission rights away to coal and oil companies. Some of the revenue generated by auctioning allowances will be used to support the development of clean energy, to invest in energy efficiency improvements, and to address transition costs, including helping American workers affected by this economic transition.
Confront Deforestation and Promote Carbon Sequestration: Obama will develop domestic incentives that reward forest owners, farmers, and ranchers when they plant trees, restore grasslands, or undertake farming practices that capture carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Invest in a Clean Energy Future
Invest $150 Billion over 10 Years in Clean Energy: Obama will invest $150 billion over 10 years to advance the next generation of biofuels and fuel infrastructure, accelerate the commercialization of plug-in hybrids, promote development of commercial-scale renewable energy, invest in low-emissions coal plants, and begin the transition to a new digital electricity grid. A principal focus of this fund will be devoted to ensuring that technologies that are developed in the U.S. are rapidly commercialized in the U.S. and deployed around the globe.
Double Energy Research and Development Funding: Obama will double science and research funding for clean energy projects including those that make use of our biomass, solar and wind resources.
Invest in a Skilled Clean Technologies Workforce: Obama will use proceeds from the cap-and-trade auction program to invest in job training and transition programs to help workers and industries adapt to clean technology development and production. Obama will also create an energy-focused Green Jobs Corps to connect disconnected and disadvantaged youth with job skills for a high-growth industry.
Convert our Manufacturing Centers into Clean Technology Leaders: Obama will establish a federal investment program to help manufacturing centers modernize and Americans learn the new skills they need to produce green products.
Clean Technologies Deployment Venture Capital Fund: Obama will create a Clean Technologies Venture Capital Fund to fill a critical gap in U.S. technology development. Obama will invest $10 billion per year into this fund for five years. The fund will partner with existing investment funds and our National Laboratories to ensure that promising technologies move beyond the lab and are commercialized in the U.S
Require 25 Percent of Renewable Electricity by 2025: Obama will establish a 25 percent federal Renewable Portfolio Standard (RPS) to require that 25 percent of electricity consumed in the U.S. is derived from clean, sustainable energy sources, like solar, wind and geothermal by 2025.
Develop and Deploy Clean Coal Technology: Obama will significantly increase the resources devoted to the commercialization and deployment of low-carbon coal technologies. Obama will consider whatever policy tools are necessary, including standards that ban new traditional coal facilities, to ensure that we move quickly to commercialize and deploy low carbon coal technology.
Support Next Generation Biofuels
Deploy Cellulosic Ethanol: Obama will invest federal resources, including tax incentives, cash prizes and government contracts into developing the most promising technologies with the goal of getting the first two billion gallons of cellulosic ethanol into the system by 2013.
Expand Locally-Owned Biofuel Refineries: Less than 10 percent of new ethanol production today is from farmer-owned refineries. New ethanol refineries help jumpstart rural economies. Obama will create a number of incentives for local communities to invest in their biofuels refineries.
Establish a National Low Carbon Fuel Standard: Barack Obama will establish a National Low Carbon Fuel Standard to speed the introduction of low-carbon non-petroleum fuels. The standard requires fuels suppliers to reduce the carbon their fuel emits by ten percent by 2020.
Increase Renewable Fuel Standard: Obama will require 36 billion gallons of renewable fuels to be included in the fuel supply by 2022 and will increase that to at least 60 billion gallons of advanced biofuels like cellulosic ethanol by 2030.
Set America on Path to Oil Independence
Obama’s plan will reduce oil consumption by at least 35 percent, or 10 million barrels per day, by 2030. This will more than offset the equivalent of the oil we would import from OPEC nations in 2030.

Increase Fuel Economy Standards: Obama will double fuel economy standards within 18 years. His plan will provide retooling tax credits and loan guarantees for domestic auto plants and parts manufacturers, so that they can build new fuel-efficient cars rather than overseas companies. Obama will also invest in advanced vehicle technology such as advanced lightweight materials and new engines.
Improve Energy Efficiency 50 Percent by 2030
Set National Building Efficiency Goals: Barack Obama will establish a goal of making all new buildings carbon neutral, or produce zero emissions, by 2030. He’ll also establish a national goal of improving new building efficiency by 50 percent and existing building efficiency by 25 percent over the next decade to help us meet the 2030 goal.
Establish a Grant Program for Early Adopters: Obama will create a competitive grant program to award those states and localities that take the first steps to implement new building codes that prioritize energy efficiency.
Invest in a Digital Smart Grid: Obama will pursue a major investment in our utility grid to enable a tremendous increase in renewable generation and accommodate modern energy requirements, such as reliability, smart metering, and distributed storage
Restore U.S. Leadership on Climate Change
Create New Forum of Largest Greenhouse Gas Emitters: Obama will create a Global Energy Forum — that includes all G-8 members plus Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa –the largest energy consuming nations from both the developed and developing world. The forum would focus exclusively on global energy and environmental issues.
Re-Engage with the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change: The UNFCCC process is the main international forum dedicated to addressing the climate problem and an Obama administration will work constructively within it.
Barack Obama’s Record
Renewable Fuels: Obama has worked on numerous efforts in the Senate to increase access to and use of renewable fuels. Obama passed legislation with Senator Jim Talent (R-MO) to give gas stations a tax credit for installing E85 ethanol refueling pumps. The tax credit covers 30 percent of the costs of switching one or more traditional petroleum pumps to E85, which is an 85 percent ethanol/15 percent gasoline blend. Obama also sponsored an amendment that became law providing $40 million for commercialization of a combined flexible fuel vehicle/hybrid car within five years.CAFÉ: Obama introduced a bold new plan that brought Republicans and Democrats, CAFÉ supporters and long-time opponents together in support of legislation that will gradually increase fuel economy standards and offer what the New York Times editorial page called “real as opposed to hypothetical results.”

This article represents a near-perfect instantiation of the old adage “the perfect is the enemy of the good”. Our author scans over a gaggle of AGW-denying politicians and selects Barack Obama for condemnation, because Mr. Obama is good but not good enough to meet our author’s standards. Meanwhile, a host of far worse politicians go uncondemned.

Turning to industrial concerns, our author selects Toyota, the only major automobile company to actually do something serious about gasoline consumption – and condemns them, because they’re not good enough. Meanwhile, the dinosaurs in Detroit who took no action and derided Toyota for its boldness – they get an honorable unmention.

I won’t criticize the other awards. While I have some quibbles, I don’t find them absurd, as I do in the case of the first two awards.

He has the best climate plan in town – though Clinton’s is very, very close. He can’t possibly be compared to Bush. Bush has been doing everything in his power to accelerate global warming. You really, really need to retract that.

His plan, which I’m not sure you’ve read, does NOT have its first target in 42 years. It would mandate “reducing emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.” That is a VERY ambitious plan for someone who would be taking office in 2009. Certainly we couldn’t get back to 1990 levels any sooner.

Please read his full plan. You can find it here.
http://climateprogress.org/2007/10/09/obamas-excellent-energy-and-climate-plan/

Bush deserves “2007 SmogMaker Award” – as I have noted in a number of recent posts. Obama ain’t close to “George Bush lite.” Please retract that.

This and the previous post both make reasonable points; the perfect is the enemy of the good; and Obama’s may well be the best plan in town (a test that isn’t that demanding).

But we’re here to talk about spin. We’re here to point out when the public message is being twisted more vigorously than the facts warrant.

In Toyota’s case, the company is outperforming its competitors (I bought a Toyota Matrix almost purely on the strength of its fuel economy), but they remain resolutely part of the problem, actively fighting regulations that might encourage other carmakers to catch up. I think it’s perfectly fair to dock them points for taking that position.

As for Obama, your point that he would “implement a mandate of reducing emissions to 1990 levels by 2020.” is also well-taken, but that does not address his enthusiasm for coal, his reliance on ethanol, and his stated preference for doing an effective end-around on the UN’s Framework Convention on Climate Change.

If he were to clarify his positions on those issues, I am sure we would be willing to “strip him” of the award.

“Obama will consider whatever policy tools are necessary, including standards that ban new traditional coal facilities, to ensure that we move quickly to commercialize and deploy low carbon coal technology.”

“Global warming is an environmental problem, not a political one. And people who try to ‘solve’ it with political or public relations spin are just making the problem worse,” said James Hoggan, co-founder of the DeSmogBlog.”

There is just no way to ‘spin’ global warming into anything worse than what it really is!! it is the worst threat to human survival and the planets survival ever faced, ever!

I liked this article. enjoy-

http://estrecho.indymedia.org/newswire/display/72758/index.php

In a scene from the Beatles’ “I am the Walrus”, Barack Obama, Al Gore, Bob and Sarah Dylan and Britney Spears have all become entwined in a wave of positive hope and change sweeping across the United States and our home Planet Earth. In “I am the Walrus” the Beatles sang “I am he as you are he as you are me and we are all together. See how they run like pigs from a gun, see how they fly, I’m crying.” Scientists say that all of our cells die and are replaced every seven years and that inside of every human being is an atom from every person who has ever lived but what do scientists know, they only flew us to the moon to play golf.

In a recent interview with Time Magazine Nobel Laureate Al Gore said, “Everything I do is within the context of priority number one: how can I help contribute to a solution to the climate crisis? When I was in the Snow and Ice Data Center, receiving a full briefing on the polar ice caps, afterwards I would turn on my TV and there were two networks with the bulletin: ‘Britney Spears loses custody of her children.’ We’re living in a madhouse if our priorities focus on Britney Spears’ custody battle, the embalming of Anna Nicole Smith, or the trial of O.J. Simpson, while we ignore the greatest crisis this nation has ever faced, climate change disaster.” According to Nobel Laureate Al Gore, our home Planet Earth is a madhouse, a lunatic asylum, and we are all insane.

Insantiy is when due to a mental illness a person is a danger to themselves or to others, or due to mental illness a person does not understand the nature and consequences of their actions.

Last night Britney Spears was declared insane by a doctor and forcibly carted off to the insane asylum in a video clip spread repeatedly around the world via TV and the internet. Bob Dylan wrote a song called “Like a Rolling Stone” which applies to Britney Spears and all the people of Planet Earth today. Bob Dylan wrote, “Once upon a time you dressed so fine, you threw the bums a dime in your prime, didn’t you? People call, say beware doll, you’re bound to fall. You thought they were all kiddin you, you used to laugh about, everybody that was hangin out, now you don’t talk so loud, now you don’t seem so proud. About having to be scrounging your nest meal. How does it feel, How does it feel, To be without a home, Like a complete unknown, Like a rolling stone?” Watch Bob Dylan and the Rolling Stones sing it, here www.youtube.com/watch

The white people of the United States brought the black people over from Africa to be their oppressed and lynched slaves. The white American Ku Klux Klan terrorists dressed in white robes, with white hoods, and gathered around large burning crosses and held up small burning crosses and hung black Americans from trees because of the color of their skin. Then, on January 15, 1929, Martin Luther King Jr. was born in Atlanta, Georgia. In 1964 Martin Luther King won the Nobel Peace Prize. In 1986 the United States of America declared a national holiday, Martin Luther King Day.

Martin Luther King paved the way for Barack Obama, the modern Elvis, Beatlemania, Barack Obama, whose message of hope and change, to beat back climate change, to end our dependency on “the tyranny of oil”, to end the war in Iraq led to his victory in Iowa last night, and has him poised to be the next President of the United States. If this happens, it will be like the arrival of the Messiah, to lead the charge to end global warming which is leading us all to desertification of our home, Planet Earth which will lead to fighting over the remaining fresh water and soil and nuclear world war III which will have no survivors and leave the planet earth our home permanently radioactive and uninhabitable.

Because Martin Luther King said, “I have a dream”, the United States is about to cast off it’s last vestiges of racism, elect a black President, and become a light unto the world, leading it to world peace and safety. In her song “Dreamer”, Sarah Dylan of the young generation supporting Barack Obama and Oprah Winfrey’s battle against climate change sings, “If I asked you just one question, what would your answer be, life was simple, but I knew that it would be more complicated. Who can laugh like, who can be mine, who can ask for more, the score is falling, my dreams are calling, they lead me past your door. Who loves you, who needs you, who wants you to come home, they say that you’re a dreamer, But I want you as my own…Your mind is slipping…You’re lost, I can’t help you to find the one you’re looking for. Don’t you know you’re the one I’m looking for.” www.myspace.com/sarahdylanmusic We all are lost in a madhouse, says Al Gore, but now we are finding our way thanks to the many courageous dreamers and visionaries among us.

Britney, the answer to Sarah Dylan’s question is your two beautiful sons, Sean Preston, 2, and Jayden James, 1. Your children love you, your children need you, your children want you to come home. The United States is mainly a Christian country based upon love for yourself, the components of your body, air, water and earth, and the air, water and earth making up your neighbors. Loving yourself and loving your neighbors does not include mocking them, or laughing at them, or tearing them to pieces or poisoning the air, water or earth the children are all made of, no matter their skin color. If we continue on this course, then soon Bob Dylan’s words will come true for every child on earth, “How does it feel, How does it feel, To be without a home, (Planet Earth) Like a complete unknown, Like a (radioactive) rolling stone?”

Bill and Hillary Clinton refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. The time has come for Barack Obama. The future of our home Planet Earth depends upon it. If the United States can evolve from a racist to a non racist country then everything is possible if we all unite to beat back the impending disaster of climate change. The time has come to replace hatred with love. It’s now or never. Do it for the children. Blessed are the peacemakers and blessed are the environmentalists.

Today, the Space and Science Research Center, (SSRC) in Orlando, Florida announces that it has confirmed the recent web announcement of NASA solar physicists that there are substantial changes occurring in the sun’s surface. The SSRC has further researched these changes and has concluded they will bring about the next climate change to one of a long lasting cold era.

Today, Director of the SSRC, John Casey has reaffirmed earlier research he led that independently discovered the sun’s changes are the result of a family of cycles that bring about climate shifts from cold climate to warm and back again.

“We today confirm the recent announcement by NASA that there are historic and important changes taking place on the sun’s surface. This will have only one outcome - a new climate change is coming that will bring an extended period of deep cold to the planet. This is not however a unique event for the planet although it is critically important news to this and the next generations. It is but the normal sequence of alternating climate changes that has been going on for thousands of years. Further according to our research, this series of solar cycles are so predictable that they can be used to roughly forecast the next series of climate changes many decades in advance. I have verified the accuracy of these cycles’ behavior over the last 1,100 years relative to temperatures on Earth, to well over 90%.”

As to what these changes are Casey says, “The sun’s surface flows have slowed dramatically as NASA has indicated. This process of surface movement, what NASA calls the “conveyor belt” essentially sweeps up old sunspots and deposits new ones. NASA’s studies have found that when the surface movement slows down, sunspot counts drop significantly. All records of sunspot counts and other proxies of solar activity going back 6,000 years clearly validates our own findings that when we have sunspot counts lower then 50 it means only one thing - an intense cold climate, globally. NASA says the solar cycle 25, the one after the next that starts this spring will be at 50 or lower. The general opinion of the SSRC scientists is that it could begin even sooner within 3 years with the next solar cycle 24. What we are saying today is that my own research and that of the other scientists at the SSRC verifies that NASA is right about one thing – a solar cycle of 50 or lower is headed our way. With this next solar minimum predicted by NASA, what I call a “solar hibernation,” the SSRC forecasts a much colder Earth just as it has transpired before for thousands of years. If NASA is the more accurate on the schedule, then we may see even warmer temperatures before the bottom falls out. If the SSRC and other scientists around the world are correct then we have only a few years to prepare before 20-30 years of lasting and possibly dangerous cold arrive.”

"Fossil-fuel companies have spent millions funding anti-global-warming think tanks, purposely creating a climate of doubt around the science. DeSmogBlog is the antidote to that obfuscation." ~ BRYAN WALSH, TIME MAGAZINE